


And How Do You Say "Promise Me"?

by jazzhandslazuli



Category: Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Genre: F/F, Fluff, Gem Egg Hell, Jasper POV, also kinda serious, and lots of declaration of love without ever using the word love, look an egg hell au where no one is sad and no one dies, peridot is the carrier, set before the return
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-13
Updated: 2016-04-13
Packaged: 2018-06-02 01:32:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,733
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6545035
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jazzhandslazuli/pseuds/jazzhandslazuli
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jasper experiences the gem version of feeling the baby kick and gets hit with a long-dead maternal instinct at 96000 mph.</p><p>Meanwhile, Peridot takes a nap.</p>
            </blockquote>





	And How Do You Say "Promise Me"?

Jasper found Peridot sprawled and unmoving against the ship’s console. Shit. Fuck. Had she been attacked? No one could get on the ship. No one should be able to get on the ship. Shit. In every security breach drill they had ever performed, it was Peridot who was supposed to lockdown the ship so they could be safe and think of a solution. But Peridot was already incapacitated. Peridot was attacked and Jasper wasn’t there to protect her. 

Jasper stepped closer and realised that Peridot was actually breathing peacefully, and that there were no signs of struggle or damage, and that she was partaking in a voluntary state of unconsciousness known on some planets as ‘sleep’.

Which Jasper would have realised if she had spent two seconds applying some analytical skills instead of jumping to a paranoid conclusion. Face red, she pulled a chair out and sat beside the sleeping gem, lacing her touch stumps through Peridot’s hair.

She was very glad Peridot was not awake right now, and not just because Peridot liked to make fun of her when she was worried (but really, Jasper couldn’t control that. She was a quartz. Fiercely protective and loyal came with the territory.). Peridot needed rest. The lines at her brow had smoothed, the dark circles around her eyes fading, and she looked more relaxed than she had in weeks. 

Ever since they found out she was carrying.

Peridot needed rest because incubating gems needed a certain amount of energy in order to properly develop, and it was almost too much for a gem like Peridot to keep up with. 

Peridot shifted with a sigh, and Jasper’s hand retreated, but Peridot just moved her arms so she could rest her cheek against them. Peridot’s gem lit up brightly, and a projection of green light appeared against the opposite wall. Jasper raised her eyebrows. Peridot was still asleep, so the projection must be involuntary. 

Jasper watched as the projection changed, different shades of green appearing and forming shapes, shapes that were very familiar. A jasper gem and two peridot gems. The light kept changing, becoming almost white around the gems in the shapes of bodies with arms and legs. Were these memories? Dreams?

One of the peridots was clearly her Peridot. Bigger than the others, with limb enhancers and gem on her forehead. The other Peridot was tiny, with a gem on her chest. The Jasper, in the middle, with a gem in the middle of her forehead, just like…

It was suddenly very clear that Jasper was looking at their gemlings. Her gemlings. A smile split her face.   
“Shit,” she whispered.   
They didn’t form any further than the silhouettes, like the were trying to form their projected body but couldn’t quite reach it yet. They didn’t do a whole lot of moving, either, but they were there, they were real, and Jasper was absolutely enthralled.

She couldn’t describe it, and she couldn’t explain it, but she understood suddenly why the Diamonds had banned this process all those thousands of years ago. Jasper was a seasoned veteran, regarded even among her fellow quartzes as the picture of a perfect, loyal soldier. She never thought it possible that there would be anything more important to her than the Diamonds, yet without thinking she had already made the choice to betray her Diamond before such a choice had to be made. 

Time seemed to stop as Jasper watched her gemlings, and she didn’t know how much time passed before the projection abruptly faded and Peridot murmured beside her. She was awake, if barely, lifting her head up and moving her arms so it rested on the ends of her limb enhancers. Her eyes opened to slits, but focused on nothing, and she squeezed them shut again and groaned.

“Morning, Sleeping Beauty,” Jasper teased. Peridot jumped and looked up at her, eyes wide. 

“Jasper?” she choked. “Ugh, sorry, I should be working.” She scrubbed at her eyes and pushed herself into her feet, making her way to the other side of the console. She wobbled a little as she walked, and suddenly Jasper was at her side, holding Peridot around the middle, as Peridot braced herself against the console. 

“Are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” Peridot assured. “I just stood up too fast. My head went funny.” She let go of the console and started typing numbers and commands. Jasper loosened her grip but kept her arms in Peridot’s general vicinity. Just in case. 

“Maybe that means you should sit down again,” said Jasper. Peridot scoffed.

“Are you joking? I’m way too busy to slack off anymore. You just worry too much.”

“I’m always going to worry about you,” said Jasper, resting her chin on the top of Peridot’s head. “So, you know, get over it.”

Jasper watched Peridot work. It all looked so complicated. Numbers and reports flashed across the screen too fast for Jasper to comprehend, but it seemed to come so naturally to Peridot. That was kind of the point. 

Jasper wondered if the gemlings were changing Peridot’s nature as deeply as they were changing her own. No, not changing, just… refocusing. She already knew that Peridot couldn’t link her consciousness with the computer anymore. They weren’t sure if it took up too much energy, or somehow impeded their development somehow, but connecting with the computer made Peridot incredibly unwell. Nauseated, dizzy, and in unrelenting pain. She couldn’t use her log for long periods of time either. Peridot directed all complaints about this to Jasper, as a sort of temporary logging system (one that would respond with either sarcastic ‘it sucks to be you’s or legitimate attempts at comfort, depending on how sad Peridot looked at the time). 

She tried not to wince too obviously, but Jasper noticed everything. Peridot kneaded her fingers into the skin around her gem. Jasper frowned. 

“So what are you even doing?” asked Jasper.

“Checking for aberrations in the airlock and making sure the atmospheric pressure is maintained,” said Peridot absently. “Checking for security breaches, making sure there is a sufficient amount of energy being generated…” Peridot continued to list off activities in an increasingly monotonous tone.

They were in the vacuum of space; security concerns would be minimal (never mind that Jasper had freaked out about security recently. That was different.). Obviously the airlock was also fine, since they were inside and not outside the ship. They didn’t seem like 100% necessary tasks, and Jasper hated to see Peridot overwork herself.

So it was settled. Jasper tightened her arms around Peridot again and lifted her, drawing one arm under Peridot’s knees and the other across her back. Peridot squeaked and kicked her legs out, struggling against the hold but with neither the energy nor the real desire to escape.

“What are you doing, clod?” she cried. 

“I was just thinking, you could take a nap and I’ll do your work for you,” Jasper grinned. She sat back in her chair, Peridot falling into place on her lap, and Peridot immediately resigned herself to her fate. “It can’t be that hard.” 

Peridot snorted. “Excuse me? This is my life’s work! It’s very in-depth and complicated and I can’t trust you to get it right.”

“You don’t trust me?” said Jasper in faux distress. 

“I trust you with my life,” said Peridot. “Just not with my ship.”

“I can’t believe you don’t trust me.” Peridot giggled. “What kind of example is this going to set for our gemlings?”

The control room fell into heavy silence as Peridot tensed up, anxiously twisting her fingers. “I need to work if we want any chance of going home,” she said. “We can’t afford to not be perfect. I can’t afford to make any more mistakes.”

Jasper sighed and took Peridot’s fingers in her hand. “Peridot, do you really think we’ll be welcomed back home?”

“Yes?” she said. “Maybe? I don’t know. Yellow Diamond is reasonable; we didn’t really know what we were doing. Maybe she’ll be sympathetic. If we prove we really are loyal.” They locked eyes. Peridot’s mouth was downturned and a little shaky, her eyes worried. It wasn’t a declaration of her actual hope, it was a naïve grasping at straws, she was exhausted, and she was begging for Jasper to play along, and pretend that everything is fine.

“I’m not loyal to Yellow Diamond, or Homeworld,” said Jasper. She promised herself thousands of years ago that she would never say those words, not under the most agonising of tortures. She was a quartz through and through. And here she was whispering them as a comfort into the ear of a tiny Peridot who was carrying her gemlings. And they came so easily, and she would say It again.

“You can’t say that,” said Peridot, voice panicked.

“Traditional methods of reproduction are banned on Homeworld, and it’s because I can never say I am loyal to the Diamonds ever again. We’ve created something never heard of before, and it’s something so new and special and I can’t let you think that that’s a mistake.”

Jasper pressed her lips against Peridot’s gem despite the blazing heat. Peridot’s breath caught in her throat and she shivered.  
“What are we going to do?” she whispered.

“We’ll figure it out,” said Jasper.

“There’s nowhere in the galaxy that the Diamonds haven’t touched.”

“So we’ll live in the ship. I don’t care. What ever we do, I promise the three of you will be safe.”

“Three?”

“You and the two gemlings.”

Peridot’s eyes lit up. “There are two? How do you know?”

Jasper’s eyes crinkled up as she smiled. “I saw them. When you were asleep, you made like a gem projection and I saw them.”

“Oh my stars,” Peridot whispered. “I mean, of course, it’s part of their development. Eventually they’ll need to project their own forms, it’s a sort of practice or attempt. A similar thing happens in some kindergartens. I can’t believe I missed that! There are two?”

“A Peridot and a Jasper,” Jasper confirmed. “They’re so small, they’re smaller than you.”

“No wonder Homeworld moved to kindergartens. Much more efficient.” She closed her eyes and curled against Jasper, her head resting against Jasper’s chest. “Do you think they’ll stay tiny or will they grow? Do they need to manually consume energy like organic species?”

“Maybe. Who knows. But I want to find out with you.”

**Author's Note:**

> "Promise me you'll stay beyond the sunrise  
>  I don't care at all what people say beyond the sunrise."
> 
> I know Lapis is probably on the ship somewhere but I honestly don't care enough to decide what's going on wrt her they drop her off at the nearest Homeworld colony and go become hot space pirate moms with their little ankle biters
> 
> My tumblr is regretanddeepspacelime, concrit is always appreciated <3


End file.
